Atonement
by madstoryteller999
Summary: Hermione saves Sirius in the Department of Mysteries—but at the cost of a death eater's life. As she struggles to reconcile her actions, Bellatrix Black, the Dark Lord's infamous lieutenant, develops a dangerous, unrelenting interest in her. What follows is a series of unprecedented events, unlikely mentors, and Hermione's own fracturing sanity. / Hermione-centric / Snape Mentor
1. Chapter 1

From the get-go: This is Bellatrix totally re-imagined; that is a key premise of this story. So...please don't be surprised/offended when my Bellatrix is nothing like the book's :)

* * *

 **Chapter One**

"Who's that behind Malfoy?" Harry whispered urgently to her, green eyes straining in the dim lighting.

It was impossible to make out in the darkness. Though the veritable army of silver masks gleamed behind Malfoy in the Department of Mysteries, the figure slowly but steadily emerging from the shadows to his left was still unidentifiable.

And yet, Hermione had the chilling notion that she knew exactly who the approaching person was.

It was a name that had only recently begun appearing in the Daily Prophet. And then, it had dominated the newspaper and others with a frenzy. After that, it was as though a ghost that had been forgotten for fourteen years was suddenly brought back to life—a name on every witch and wizard's mouth a breath after ' _You-Know-Who._ '

"Harry…that's…that's _Bellatrix Black_ ," she heard Neville confirm in a hiss as the mask-less figure reached light, a deep, unfamiliar growl in his voice. Hermione gritted her teeth.

Reason would allow that vestiges of Black's stay at Azkaban be visible: a certain haggardness, unhinged behavior, faltering sanity.

And yet, the only thing that could be said harkened of a stint in one of the Wizarding World's most brutal prisons was Black's short unevenly sheared hair. She was cloaked in the same luxuriant, silken robes that the other male death eaters wore with black slacks and dragon-hide boots. Her stance, far from weakened or injured in comparison to her counterparts, was dominated by a certain deadly stillness; she stood with hips thrust slightly forward (strangely, as though to proudly emphasize something Hermione knew for a fact Black did not have). Dark brows, sharp cheekbones, harsh jaw, and a certain cocky tilt of the head only further contributed to a marked impression of androgyny.

"Well," the infamous death eater spoke, a strange charismatic roughness to her voice as she fixed her gaze on Harry. It was lower than expected. "If it isn't the Boy-Who-Lived."

She looked deceptively young, Hermione noted further with trepidation. It was common knowledge that wizards—particularly powerful ones—aged at a much slower rate. Dumbledore himself was well over a century in years despite appearing only in his sixties. Sirius, for that matter, looked scarcely five years older than a Hogwarts graduate, though visibly haunted by more worldly demons. Black's baffling youth, unfortunately, was unwelcome but undeniable proof that her alleged magical prowess was beyond tall tale.

Hermione watched as Harry stiffened.

Lucius Malfoy came to the fore, his voice slow and calm as he removed his mask. His expression was disarmingly pleasant, as though coaxing a child to give up a toy before bedtime. "You know why we're here, Potter."

Hermione glanced at the glowing orb in question, moving slightly in front of it defensively. For one chilling, breathless moment, she felt Black's dark eyes flicker to her, before they returned to rest lazily on Harry once more.

"Why did Voldemort need me to come and get this?" Harry asked, voice strong. But she could see his shoulders trembling, and she knew that he had realized: this had all been a trap—the dream, Sirius being captured, Voldemort being at the ministry.

"You _dare_ speak his name?!" another death eater roared, stepping forward, " _YOU FILTHY HALFBLOOD_!" He raised his wand to fire a spell at them, but Malfoy placed a restraining gloved hand on the masked death eater's wrist, forcing the wand away.

"Harry," Hermione whispered to him, taking advantage of the minor power struggle between Malfoy and the unknown death eater, " _We need to get you out now_. I—I think prophecies can be accessed only by the people they're about. I think Voldemort couldn't remove the orb himself or he wouldn't have tricked you here."

"Potter," the elder Malfoy interrupted. He had finished dealing with the errant death eater. "You know how this goes. You either make this easy for your friends—and simply hand the prophecy over—or we force it from your hands through more violent means of persuasion. And I assure you, that would make things _challenging_ for your friends."

Harry stood still. Hermione watched as, encouraged, Malfoy began to inch forward with his arm outstretched. Ginny, Neville, and Luna shifted to focus on Malfoy's approach, but Hermione kept her eyes on Black, wary of the wand she dangled almost carelessly in her hand.

"Haven't you always wondered," Malfoy whispered, moving closer slowly, "the reason for why you and the Dark Lord share this connection? Why he was unable to kill you when you were just a boy?"

Hermione watched from the corner of her eye as Malfoy paused for a second, gaze intensifying. He seemed to latch onto something in Harry's eyes. "Don't you want to know, Harry? The answers to all your questions…the secret of that miracle scar—"

"NOW!" Harry roared. Hermione jerked as she watched Black suddenly come to life, a savage grin on her dynamic features. Harry had raced down the perpendicular aisle, and without pause, Black sent a curse after him and made chase.

Hermione flew into action, knocking a row of prophecies down from behind her and sprinting down the long aisle. She glanced back quickly to notice that Malfoy was the death eater chasing her. As she sent back stunning curses, she couldn't help but analyze the meaning of these assignments. Harry was clearly the most valuable of them, and Malfoy had allowed, perhaps even anticipated, that Black be the one to pursue Harry…which meant that Bellatrix Black, even after having just returned from Azkaban, was still Voldemort's de facto lieutenant. If all the rumors that had been circulating about her were true…

"Reducto!" Hermione shouted, aiming a well-placed curse at the floor in front of Malfoy. The ground crumbled in front of Malfoy, forcing him to come to a full stop.

Hermione plunged ahead into the darkness, racing towards a hint of light she saw ahead of her. Squinting, she roughly made out a figure with red hair twenty meters or so in front of her.

"Hermione!" she heard. She turned to see Harry running behind her. He looked considerably worse than he had been when he left her, blood dripping from cuts in numerous locations. They had been made with almost surgical precision.

" _Where is she_ , Harry?" Hermione hissed to him worriedly over her shoulder as she made it past the door to Ron. Harry was only a couple of feet behind her now.

"I don't know, I don't know," Harry yelled desperately, making it through the door. Hermione and Ron moved to slam the door shut. Just as they were about to close it, however, one more presence made it through.

Dark mist formulized into a nonchalant figure leaning casually against the wall opposite them. Dark grey eyes shadowed by midnight brows examined them with cold amusement.

"I must say, Potter," Black murmured, "I had imagined Dumbledore would have made you a better duelist."

Harry trembled with rage, green eyes blazing. With a grandiose wave, he shouted, "Expelliarmus!"

But Black merely flicked the spell away with a twist of her wrist, dark uneven bangs falling into her eyes as she tilted her head. "Come on," the rough voice coaxed, "Give me something _more_. Show me what you can do." The words tugged at Hermione strangely, but she ignored it.

Harry seemed to contemplate the idea, alternately tightening then loosening his hold on his wand. After a moment, however, he seemed to make a decision. With the reflexes of a seeker, he lunged to the side and aimed a bombarda curse at the tank behind Black, creating a diversion for them to run once more.

In the chaos of the explosion, Hermione ignored the dark, throaty laughter that could only be Black's and grabbed Harry and Ron's hands to race to the opposite end of the room. Arriving in front of another door, she raised her wand to blast it open, revealing a large underground chamber with a large stone structure in the middle.

Seemingly alone, they moved to the center of the room and turned at the sound of panting to see Neville, Luna, and Ginny join them from another entrance. They immediately huddled together, placing Harry and the prophecy in the middle of them. Only seconds passed before they were immersed in a dark mist and surrounded by dozens of death eaters, Malfoy at the front.

"Potter," Malfoy hissed, all pretense of calmness gone from his demeanor, " _Hand it over._ "

When Harry made no move, Malfoy reluctantly raised his wand, signaling the other death eaters to do so as well.

But before the first spell could be cast, the sound of distant pops echoed throughout the chamber. Hermione looked around and realized with great relief that the Order had arrived. Sirius appeared first, running towards Harry and pulled him protectively behind a boulder. Shacklebolt, Made-Eye Moody, and Lupin then appeared, and proceeded to engage the death eaters in battle. Tonks and a legion of other members she wasn't too familiar with joined the fight seconds later, giving Hermione and the others opportunity to duck behind other boulders and columns.

To the right, she saw Tonks dueling Dolohov. Just a little behind her and in front of the arching stone structure, Harry and Sirius were dueling Malfoy and an older man who looked very much like Theodore Nott from their year. Gesturing for Neville, Ginny, Luna, and Ron to stay put, Hermione cast a disillusionment charm on herself and ducked under spells as she investigated the room. No matter where she looked, however, she had yet to find Black—which was imminently concerning.

She ducked under a stray curse, but froze when she saw a jet of light miss Harry by the breadth of a hair from Nott. Sirius quickly sent a series of quick curses in the death eater's direction while Malfoy was recovering, and managed to send him flying through the air into the opposite wall.

Sirius then turned on Malfoy again with lightning quickness and finished him off with the same humiliating ease. Hermione found herself amending her impression of Sirius slightly. Until now, he had always come off as too impulsive and brash to her to be a very strategic duelist.

Seeing his opponents defeated, however, Sirius returned to his true nature and paused to bark in laughter, an edge of mockery to his voice. As Sirius opened his mouth to say something to Harry, Hermione felt a strange tingling behind her neck.

Years from then, she would contemplate what exactly made her turn her head just so in that moment. How it was possible that with unerring accuracy, she tilted her head at exactly that 45-degree angle and caught sight of the person who had been hidden from them for the past five minutes and managed to stop something she knew would have wrecked Harry for the rest of his life.

A pale long fingered hand whipped out from dark mist as the rest of a figure began to solidify in the corner of the room, sending forth a vibrant stream of green that electrified the air. Hermione felt her heart stop as her mind panicked, trying to formulate a solution rapidly. It was too late to warn Sirius; Hermione wouldn't reach him—was at the wrong angle for her to send a spell at him—in time to push him out of the way. No spell could block the killing curse. No spell could stop it…

No _spell_ could…

Before she could fully process the thought, Hermione soundlessly levitated Nott's unconscious body—the closest solid object—and placed it in line of the spell. A second later, the spell hit and Nott convulsed, his eyes opening in his last moment of consciousness—wide, panicked brown eyes that sent Hermione's heart falling into her stomach. And then, he was no more.

For the first time since the battle had started, there seemed to be silence in the room as everyone struggled to determine what had exactly happened after the flash of green.

Hermione paled and clutched her midsection, nausea rolling through her.

"Damn, cousin. It seems that the infamous Black luck has yet to desert you," Black's rough, drawling voice echoed throughout the cavernous room.

Sirius's handsome face tightened coldly, his expression suddenly strikingly similar to his mother's portrait as he grabbed Harry and placed him protectively behind him.

Black was all hard angles and edges in this room, the light highlighting certain planes of her face and casting others into shadow. In her hand, she twirled a jagged ebony black wand, analyzing the young witch who had stopped her spell.

"And who…" the Dark Lord's lieutenant questioned with a tilted head, leaning forward, "are you?"

Hermione heard the words as though through a vacuum; they were incomprehensible to her. Lupin made a step toward her but someone held him back.

"Killing an unconscious man…" the pureblood continued conversationally, lifting a finger to flick dark bangs out of her eyes as she prowled closer to Hermione, "There's a certain irony to that, somewhere. Although, I can't say Nott was a devastating loss. Isn't that right, Lucius?"

Malfoy pulled himself up from the floor, legs trembling, "I-Indeed."

"Indeed," Black repeated slowly, mockingly. Her attention snapped back to Hermione. "Your name or I kill one of your friends."

The threat ripped Hermione out of the haze she had been in. In that moment, she forgot the power of a name, evaluated that what she offered was meaningless, and, for the purpose of buying time for more reinforcements to arrive, said tonelessly: "Hermione Granger."

Black's tongue darted out to glance her lip. "Ah, a mudblood. And yet, your predecessors seemed to have followed our own customs in naming you."

Maybe it was because she had just recently become a murderer. Maybe it was because she was too in shock to really care. But at those words, Hermione felt the burgeoning of an all too dangerous amount of recklessness that was undoubtedly reflective of newfound self-destructive tendencies.

"Shakespeare, actually," she bit out, glaring up at the taller witch, "Though, I suppose I can't fault you for being uncultured. I've heard Azkaban tends to hinder access to some of the finer pleasures in life."

"Hermione," Ron hissed from behind her, face paling. Hermione darted a glance at him, lips thinning.

"Well, you certainly are a Gryffindor, aren't you?" Black murmured, grey eyes dancing wickedly as she eyed Hermione's uniform.

And then she set the floor beneath them on fire.

* * *

Some had the presence of mind to try to apparate, but the thick smoke had created a thick, suffocating film that made it impossible to muster the necessary focus.

"Aguamenti!" she heard Harry shout behind her. It did not do anything.

The temperature of the room had gone up by at least thirty degrees as flames began to consume it. Several other witches and wizards tried the same spell to no avail, but she knew a simple Aguamenti would not work with advanced magic like this.

Sirius was chanting something under his breath, weaving complex patterns with his wand that were beginning to stave the flames, but not nearly quick enough. Her heart dropped to her stomach when she heard Tonks scream—a gritty, ugly sound—as flame flicked at the bottoms of her boots.

"Fuck, fuck," Hermione cursed with feeling, allowing herself this reprieve from good behavior. Mind working frantically, she found one impossible, unlikely course of action and because _she had no time to pause with Tonks screaming like that_ immediately leapt into action.

She worked solely from memory, eyes closed as her wand hand moved to carve a rune she had only managed to stumble on due to supplementary research for an Arithmancy project into the floor and prayed that her attempt would work.

It appeared that perhaps a god did exist because, miraculously, a roaring wall of water—by far, the most expansive piece of magic she had ever produced—plunged through the room and doused it and everyone in it.

Beside her, she heard Ron let out a breathy, slightly hysterical laugh.

Across the room, Black straightened, dark, burning eyes fixed on her with a small curve to her lips. Something clenched in Hermione's body at the sight, her muscles tensing.

Then, a cold chill filled the air and everyone except Black stiffened as another presence joined the room.

"I see you have things well in hand, Bellatrix." Voldemort said lightly, stepping forward with a tilted head.

Black inclined her head in turn, gaze never leaving Hermione's. "Yes, my lord. Potter is here, the prophecy is intact."

After coolly surveying the room, the Dark Lord's eyes returned to his right hand and, following her gaze, rested briefly on Hermione too. Then his gaze moved away.

"Excellent. I will take it from here."

A minute later Harry smashed the prophecy.

* * *

Author's Note

Please, please, please review!


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"How are you doing, dear?" Madame Pomfrey asked her, cheeks flushed with concern. "There's going to be a rather large scar, I fear, and you will have to take at least ten potions a day to prevent any infection, but—"

"I'm fine," Hermione responded as convincingly as she could. She watched the Weasleys hug Ron with teary eyes. "I'm fine," she repeated, gaze returning to the older woman, "I think I can leave now."

The Weasleys were finishing up with Ginny and Ron, and would next be on her. So too would Harry and Sirius once they were finished hugging and scolding each other for their respective recklessness that night.

"I suppose there's no healing left to do, and I trust you not to mess up my work," Madame Pomfrey acknowledged with a slight frown. "Very well. Turn in early tonight and get some good rest, you hear?"

Hermione nodded dimly, already slipping out of the hospital bed and out the door. Leaving the noisy hospital room made the silence of the dimly lit hallway sound deafening.

As soon as she entered another hallway, she crumpled.

Thank god Professor Dumbledore had shown up when he had, because everything had quickly fallen into shambles after Harry had smashed the prophecy. Voldemort had placed him under the Cruciatus Curse, Hermione had been too distracted to avoid Dolohov's curse, Sirius, Lupin, and Kingsley had been struggling to contain Black. And Dumbledore…

…Oh _god,_ did _Dumbledore_ know? That…that she had…

Killed a man—even if she hadn't been the one to cast the curse.

The urge to vomit hit her immediately, and it was only by pressing down on her recently healed injury—allowing pain to overwhelm her nausea—that she managed to tamp it back down. She had this—some part of her recognized, irrational—urge to keep scrubbing, chafing at her skin until it all fell off, until she had paid just a little penance for the act her hands had put into motion and—

Hermione recognized with what limited clinical capacity she had left that she was decidedly not coping well. She knew, intellectually, that talking to someone openly about a traumatic event was the best course of action when it came to dealing with one.

And yet for the life of her—Harry and Ron? They could never understand, though she was sure they would try. Her parents? A resounding _no_. They were ordinary, law-abiding dentists whose greatest concerns were figuring out their taxes by the deadline.

And she really, _really_ could not bring herself to go to Professor McGonagall and Dumbledore. What would they think of her after she told them? She would only be able to read the look in their eyes as disappointment.

She stumbled numerous times, barely catching herself against the wall, but somehow managed to reach the Gryffindor common room within the next half hour. Although there was no need for stealth, as everyone was asleep, she made her way silently to the girl's restrooms and crept as quickly as she could into the shower stall.

She cast a spell around her bandage to keep it safe from the water and stayed there, under the pelting of the water, until the early hours of the morning.

* * *

A week passed. Despite the events occurring beyond the walls of the castle, the fifth years, Harry and Ron included, had ostensibly called upon a heretofore unseen collective diligence in replicating their regular end-of-the-year cheer. Even the professors had become less strict about attendance and homework, as though striving to help them to that end.

Hermione tried her best to take part in it, but found her efforts failing and her temper becoming short. Maybe it was because she could not wear the mask of levity in the same way they could. The sentiment sounded awfully presumptuous, but Hermione did not mean that they had not had their own share of suffering. It was just that her burden was…different from theirs. She had _done_ something terrible, not been the victim of it.

Sometimes, she feared she was growing too self-pitying. Other times, she couldn't bring herself to care. Her thoughts had become an enraged litany of—Why me? Why did _I_ have to do that? Couldn't someone else have acted?

In moment of clarity, she tried to tell herself that she simply had to live with what she had done—what if's were pointless. If only she could maintain that clarity.

* * *

When Hermione arrived at the dungeons for her first period class the next day, she reached her seat a minute before class started. Snape had not entered the room yet.

"Hermione," she heard Ron say casually beside her, "I don't know if you've noticed, but most of your hair is gone."

She ignored him, pulling out her potions textbook and a quill. Indeed, her hair was much shorter than it had been the previous day. She wished she could say that the shift had had symbolic significance—perhaps a reclamation of the changes being imposed on her through a modification _she_ had engineered (unlike the scar Dolohov had left her).

It wasn't. In truth, her hairbrush had gotten stuck in her hair once again that morning. And because Hermione found herself caring a lot less now about the things she had previously spent a modicum amount of time on, she had given up after two minutes of painful tugging and just sliced the affected area off. So, yes, the hair that had once been well past her shoulder blades was gone, shortened to the tops of her shoulders. It looked like, she dared to say, normal people's hair now.

"How's Sirius, Harry?" she forced herself to ask calmly, eyes roving over the room.

"He's good," Harry responded softly, taking care to make sure no one overheard them. "Cooped up in Grimmauld Place again, but…well, if I have my way, he's never leaving there again."

Ron reached up a hand to pat Harry's back. Hermione nodded and opened her mouth to add something when the noise of a group of students' entrances drowned her out.

Scowling slightly, she looked behind her to see who was to blame for the noise. Malfoy was predictably at the forefront, followed by his usual entourage.

They passed her without a glance, but sent Harry vicious glares. Ah, that was right. Lucius Malfoy was in Azkaban now. Hermione couldn't help a twinge of unwelcome sympathy as she took in Malfoy's haggard appearance.

"Silence," a voice hissed out from behind them. Abruptly, everyone became silent. Snape stalked his way to the front of the room.

"I understand that the other professors have sought to offer you a reprieve in these last final days," Snape declared boredly, "I, however, have not. You will find ingredients for the Calming Draught at the front; successful potions will be stored in the infirmary for the hysteria you will no doubt undergo at the beginning of next semester as you increasingly realize how inept you are going into N.E.W.T.S. Assigned pairs are listed to the right."

Hermione's gaze followed the motions of his outstretched wand to the list of groups. Her face tightened when she read the cursive script.

"For Merlin's sake," Ron groaned beside her, "Parkinson."

"Tough luck, mate," Harry muttered, looking at his own pairing with a pleased expression.

"I've got Malfoy," Hermione noted darkly.

"Bloody hell," Ron offered after a moment.

With a thunderous scowl, Hermione gathered her things and made her way to the table in the very back corner.

"Mudblood," Malfoy offered tonelessly.

"Don't call me that," she snarled, hand flexing for her wand. Then, she inhaled sharply. She knew she was beginning to skate on thin ice; if she continued to let her temper grow this dangerously short, she was liable to explode at the slightest provocation. "Let's just get this over with."

She went up to the front table, gathered all the necessary ingredients, and brought it back to their shared space. Malfoy watched her blankly, before reaching over to open up his textbook. They prepared and stirred in the ingredients with minimal communication and then waited, as the book instructed, for the next fifteen minutes and thirty-four seconds.

Unable to find anything to do with herself other than glare at random objects, Hermione's gaze inevitably fell on Malfoy. His own attention was directed to somewhere off in the distance, gaze seemingly absent of life. Malfoy had always been pale, but the past week had left him with a pallor that broached sickly.

Hermione felt her lips thin. It was such a strange thing—at home, the criminals who appeared on the television were never people she actually knew. Here, everything was different. And somehow, everything—including this—made her unbearably frustrated.

Snape began walking by the finished potions, his face contorting into sneers as he saw each one. Harry's and Ron's had both ended up entirely different colors from the one listed in the textbook. They each received specifically tailored scathing remarks.

Finally, the tall man reached Hermione and Malfoy's potion. He peered into the black cauldron, sniffed delicately, tested its consistency, and then took a decisive step back.

"Well done, Mr. Malfoy. Stunningly, I believe you are the first to produce anything resembling a passable Calming Draught."

Hermione stilled at his words. It wasn't the first time he had done something like this—ignored the fact that she had been someone's partner. _Certainly_ not the first, by a mile-wide margin. And yet, despite her awareness of this fact, it was sufficient to incense her more than she could ever recall being in class.

The words slipped out of her mouth before she could stop them. "I contributed too, professor."

Snape paused in his movement to the next cauldron, turning swiftly on his heels to face her. "What was that, Miss Granger?"

"I said _I contributed too_. I thought it was curious and unfortunate that you forgot. Just thought to remind you."

Her tone, low and confrontational, did not help temper her words. Dimly, she realized that she had managed to shock even Malfoy out of his lifeless stupor.

"I must say, Miss Granger" Snape murmured after a pregnant pause, "you have the dubious honor of having surprised me. Detention. Next Saturday. Noon."

* * *

Another week passed. Hermione only grew angrier.

* * *

"Hi Hermione!" She jerked in her seat, interrupted from her thoughts. Hermione looked up to see Lavender and Parvati settle across from her at the table.

"Hi," she responded, shutting her tome to be polite. What day was it again? Saturday. Darting her gaze at the giant clock, she frowned. She had detention with Snape in ten or so minutes.

Lavender beamed brightly at her as she ladled some broth into her bowl. "How are you?"

"Oh. Good…How are you?"

"Good. Good."

"You know, we've been _dying_ to ask you what diet you're on," Parvati burst out. The smell of her perfume wafted to Hermione's nose. "I swear, you've lost half a stone in the past week!"

Lavender nodded eagerly and leaned in, her flowery perfume joining the mix. The pair of their faces— both too bright, too unknowing, and too pretty to mesh well with her current grim sense of reality—suddenly became too much.

A cold, seething rage settled in. All she wanted to do was cover them with the pumpkin juice at the corner of her eye so that she could obliterate their silly—

Hermione recoiled, horrified at the tenor of her own thoughts.

"I'm sorry," she snapped out too harshly to be polite, "I've got to go." She grabbed her belongings and walked as quickly as she could out of the Great Hall. Once she was out of sight of other students, she abandoned walking for full-out running.

A cursory glance revealed the first bathroom she reached as deserted. Locking the door behind her, she went straight to the sink and dry-heaved. When she was finished, the sound of her panting filled her ears. Looking up finally into the mirror in front of her, she confronted the image that met her gaze.

The person gazing back was alien to her.

She _had_ lost weight, because she had spent most of the last weeks upheaving meals she was trying her best to keep down. But the picture was by no means pretty: the bony face looking back at her was now dominated by dark, too-pronounced brows, pale, cracked lips, and bruised eyes.

When the great clock rang throughout the castle, she was forced to grab her things and leave the restroom. She walked blindly toward the dungeons where the potions classroom was located and knocked on the door.

Snape opened the door immediately and swiftly summoned a long assembly of filthy cauldrons.

"You will clean these," the potions master commanded coolly. "No wand, brush and water only. I expect them to be spotless." He settled behind his desk and began to grade some papers.

Hermione stiffened, gazing at the filthy cauldrons in front of her. Gritting her teeth, she grabbed the brush, dipped it well into the water, and began scrubbing.

It was tiring work. It was also the first of its kind that Hermione had ever experienced, having never had detention. Narrowing her eyes, she wondered why he had not made her do something more useful. Scrubbing cauldrons without a wand was a waste of time, when a wand could accomplish the same task in a fraction of the time. She would have been put to much better use if she had been required to brew the Calming Drought potions most of her classmates had failed to make, in order to supplement the infirmary's stores.

Growing increasingly angry, she scrubbed at the dirty cauldrons. One particular patch of mold refused to come off. Hermione scrubbed against it with more violence, snarling under breath. When that failed, she scraped at it with all her strength, numb to the damage the rough side of the cauldron was doing to her exposed forearm.

The stupid thing would not come off.

Losing her temper, she shoved the cauldron away from her, watching it hit the stone ground of the dungeons with a loud gong-like sound. Distantly, some part of her was horrified by her own actions.

The scraping of the quill a few meters in front of her slowed to a stop.

"Miss Granger," Snape spoke at last, his voice insufferably cold, "do you happen to find yourself above the task I have assigned you for your detention?"

Her jaw tightened.

"I see." The dark-robed man stood until he towered over her, dark eyes visibly measuring her and finding her lacking. "You have always had a deplorably inflated sense of your own intelligence and importance. It has grown dangerously unchecked."

She tensed, hand paling on her grip around her brush. "Really?" she spat, standing up as well. She was taller than many of her peers, but still a head shorter than him. "Forgive me, professor, for my impertinence, but I find that somewhat ironic coming from _you_."

Snape raised an eyebrow. She could tell that he was taken aback by her attitude—but Hermione was beyond being concerned with what she had been and what she should be, at the moment.

"Alas, I believe you are lashing out, Miss Granger," Snape told her boredly, "Tell me, what recent tragedy has befallen you that you feel so righteously indignant these days, that you may foolishly treat your betters this way?"

"A poor grade on an assignment, perhaps?" he continued silkily. There was a scathing look in his eyes. "Did your precious parents not get you the book you wanted for the holidays, despite your wishes? Or is it typical school girl drama: an ill-received—" his voice passed over the word derisively—" _crush_? An insult about your…teeth?"

Hermione was almost senseless with rage. Yes, she remembered that horrifying melt-down she had had only a year ago when she had been hit by the teeth-growing charm—Snape, apparently, did too. To have this—to have her _inanity_ thrown back in her face like this, the most childish, petty cares she had nursed before she had known any better. It was—

Intolerable. " _Stop_ ," she hissed.

But the potions master had scented blood now. His lips curved in dark amusement. "You are just as self-involved and ignorant as your counterparts, Miss Granger, deluding yourself that your petty school dramas warrant such copious amounts of angst, brooding, and impertinence."

The smile had vanished from Snape's face. What was left now was cool and uncaring. "You have no idea what true hardship means."

She could feel herself shaking. She knew she was teetering on the edge of something dangerous, and she did not know how to keep herself back from the abyss.

Snape noticed. He viewed her with the sort of disparaging scorn humans normally reserved for wild dogs. "Control yourself, you foolish—"

"I _can't_ ," Hermione whispered with tightly contained rage, "Believe me, _I can't_!"

Snape scoffed. "Listen to me, Granger. Stop being overdramatic. I have neither the time nor the mind to indulge your ridiculous frivolities—"

" _It's not frivolous!_ " It burst out of Hermione before she could stop it. Her face was wet, she realized dimly. She bent her head—helpless, terrified, enraged. She had to—she had _to_ —

Snape's face held terrible mockery. "Then pray tell, what _terrible_ thing has happened to you?"

And she could not hold it back, now, no more than she could hold back a tidal wave. The broken, defeated words escaped her, barely audible. For a long moment, she believed that Snape had not heard her. But when she looked up, she knew that he had. The silence echoed thunderously around them.

" _Excuse_ _me_?"

When she was finished, Snape's face was pale and unreadable.

Eventually, the silence lasted too long.

"Aren't—" she grunted, "aren't you going to say _anything_?" She had no idea what her face looked like. She didn't want to.

He gazed at her impassively. Then: "Whom have you told?"

Hermione's jaw tightened, sending her professor a vicious glare. "Believe it or not, it's not the kind of thing I use for small talk—"

"Granger," Snape snapped, his voice low.

"I-I can't talk about it," she hissed out. "I _can't_. I don't even know how— _why_ I told you. But—" and suddenly, she was begging, rocking back and forth like she was child again—" _please…_ just please…"

She did not know what she was begging for.

But there was a certain tension in Snape's face that made it seem like _he_ did. He stared at her for a long moment, a strange expression on his face that she could not begin to understand.

"Nott Senior was hardly an innocent man," he said at last. His tone was distant, removed, similar to the one he used during potions lessons.

Hermione opened her mouth, but he silenced her when he turned to face the chalkboard behind them instead. The next words came to her without the assistance of his expression.

"But he was also a husband and a father. He fulfilled, for better or worse, what many would call a…valued formative role in the lives of others."

Snape turned and noted her reaction to his words with a slight twitch in his jaw.

"Perhaps if you talk to someone else, they will encourage you to vilify him and ignore that reality," he told her coolly, lips tightening. There was an accusatory edge to his voice. "Personally, I believe to do so serves neither one's intellect nor any altruistic sense of justice benefit in the long run. Humans, unfortunately, are rarely so conveniently single-faceted."

She stiffened, trying to find some semblance of dignity as she mustered the nerve to pose the question that had been plaguing her. "So, am I—" she asked fiercely in a voice so soft it could barely be heard, "am I a monster, then?"

"Perhaps?" Snape responded tonelessly. "But make no mistake that if you are a monster, you are certainly not the only one. There are more of us than there aren't, and half of them are on the side we belong to."

He delivered the words curtly, almost callously. Which was unsurprising—Snape had never liked her, she knew. Perhaps, she was too pathetic for even him to turn away. But, for the moment, she greedily took advantage of even that pity.

"And…" she hesitated, grimacing. Then, she demanded hoarsely, "And atonement?"

The potions master looked her in chilling silence for a long moment, his dark eyes seemingly fathomless.

"I would not know," Snape responded flatly.

"But if you could _try_ , professor," She pressed tightly, gaze narrowing.

A pause. Then, almost angrily: "I have been informed that, if it exists, it comes to each man or woman in his or her own time."

"Speaking from personal experience?" she snapped, ineffectually displeased by his words. A part of her had selfishly hoped to be vindicated after this confession, or at least, given a clear answer as to how to conduct herself. But Snape did not afford her the luxury, for once (and perhaps this was ironic), of looking down at her—nor did he feed her the easy comfort she imagined another adult might have.

She did not how she felt about that.

His gaze moved to the clock on the wall in response. "Your detention is over. Leave."

Despite herself, Hermione wasn't surprised or overly upset by the abrupt dismissal. He seemed to have finished saying all he was inclined to say.

When she did leave, it was with a strange sense of a heavy burden being slightly eased from her back, though she did not really know how it had come to be.

* * *

Author's Note

So...I honestly have no idea how this popped into my head. I really shouldn't be writing this—given the other stories I need to update more regularly—but lo and behold...here I am. Should I continue? Please review and let me know :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

"I don't have a password," she announced bluntly to the stone-faced gargoyle. She stared at it. It stared back, unflinching.

It was the last day of classes, and Hermione stood in front of the entrance to the Headmaster's office.

"Look," she growled impatiently, "I _need_ to get in. I'm hardly going to attack the headmaster—and I promise not to throw anything like Harry did."

At first, it seemed as though the gargoyle had not heard her, or at least, did not care much for her words. But after a short pause, the gargoyle stepped aside with the painful sound of stone rubbing against stone to reveal a spiral staircase.

Muttering her gratitude under her breath, she charged the staircase two steps a time and ignored the burning sensation in her legs. She reached a set of oaken double doors. She didn't bother to knock, instead pushing one heavy door open to a reveal an office that was not small but gave the impression of being so, being tightly packed with so many exotic things.

Three figures paused at her entrance. The first, of course, being Professor Dumbledore himself, seated behind his desk. The second, to her slight chagrin, was Professor McGonagall. And the third—

Hermione's lips twisted as Snape's brows raised imperiously at her rude entrance.

Well, there went her plans of avoiding the potions professor for the rest of eternity. Following the eventful detention, she had been veritably repulsed by the way she had crumpled and spilled everything—to a professor who thought her conceited and _annoying_ no less—

"Miss Granger," Professor McGonagall huffed, "I have no idea how you managed to get here, nor can I imagine what has happened to your manners, but I would advise you to see yourself back at the bottom of that staircase."

"Oh, there's been no harm done, Minerva," Dumbledore assuaged her easily, eyes crinkling in a smile, "I imagine the gargoyle saw fit to let her up without my knowledge, and he is an exceptional judge of both character and circumstance."

Instinctively, somehow, Hermione knew from the behavior of both professors that they knew nothing about what had happened with Nott at the ministry. Although selfishly relieved, she wasn't terribly surprised. Most people there had been confused about what had occurred during the flash of green; the one whom she was sure did know, Sirius, was probably much too concerned with being _alive_ to debrief everyone about the details.

As it happened, only one other person in the room knew those details.

"Right," Hermione said distractedly, eyes fixated solely on the headmaster and avoiding everyone else in the room, "Could I speak with you?"

"Of course," Dumbledore nodded sagely, waiting for her to speak.

She tried to keep the polite expression on her face. "Alone?"

At that, Professor McGonagall stood up from her seat, voice sharp with reprimand. "I can hardly imagine what you would discuss with the headmaster and not in front of your own head of house and professor. Continue, Miss Granger, or not at all."

The headmaster gave Hermione an apologetic smile but did not seem to protest those words, inclining his head in apparent agreement.

Hermione stiffened, but was ultimately undeterred in the face of this ultimatum. Clearing her throat, she told them: "I would like to join the Order this summer. As a full member."

She heard Professor McGonagall inhale sharply. The smile on Dumbledore's face vanished.

"Miss Granger," the headmaster responded in a grave, quiet tone, "make no mistake that I appreciate your enthusiasm and dedication. But please understand that the best you can do, where you can affect the most positive change right now, is exactly where you have been: helping your friends, helping Harry, learning and growing and _relishing_ your adolescence. Do not let a war conceived by adults take that away from you."

Except, Hermione noted humorlessly, the war already had. And she could not possibly pretend, as a result, that this summer was like the ones before it. She couldn't spend it in the same way: whiling her days away reading books and answering letters and taking a vacation with her parents. She needed to do something meaningful—to _atone_.

Before she could respond, Professor McGonagall spoke up.

"I was positive there was a sound head on top of that body," her head of house snapped, "For Merlin's sake, Granger, you're not even of age!"

"Actually," Hermione responded with forced calm, "because of the time turner, I'll be seventeen at the beginning of July…about ten days from now."

Professor McGonagall threw her hands up in wordless disbelief, before directing her iron gaze at the headmaster. "Absolutely not, Albus. I _will not_ stand for this. Are we to throw our students in as cannon fodder as well?"

There was an unreadable expression on Dumbledore's face.

"If I remember correctly," Snape added after a pause, seemingly uncaringly—it was the first he had spoken since she had walked in—"your well-beloved Sirius Black and James Potter were hardly a few months older when they joined."

"Yes," Professor McGonagall agreed passionately, "and look how _that_ turned out!"

There was a derisive sneer on the potions professor's face. "Believe me, I am the last to award praise willingly, but it is not high praise to note that Granger has more tact and sense than those two combined."

It was hard for Hermione to ignore now that, for whatever reason, Snape seemed to agree actively that she spent the summer with the Order.

Dumbledore seemed taken aback as well, directing a gaze with sharp and unnerving intensity at the dark-cloaked man. "You surprise me, Severus. I'm not sure I know what stake you have in this debate—" his face tightened slightly—"especially given the particular angle you seem to be taking."

The expression the potions professor directed back at him revealed absolutely nothing. "Only—" he answered with deadly slowness, "only that the best that can be offered are at work on the opposite end while I risk my life doing _your_ bidding, headmaster."

The words seemed to injure Dumbledore, his face immediately becoming troubled in its pensiveness. Hermione stiffened, aware that she had been made privy to something she had never been meant to see. When she darted a quick glance at Snape's face, however, his dark eyes were enigmatic.

They waited for Dumbledore's verdict.

"Miss Granger," the headmaster announced finally, and there was finality in his tone, "you will be of age and the Order would undeniably benefit from your assistance. If you are inclined to join…I cannot in good conscience stop you."

"Albus!" Professor McGonagall exclaimed with outrage.

But he ignored her. "I will tell Alastor to position you where it makes sense given your age, experience, and skill set. As you know, the Order meets at Grimmauld Place. If you do not change your mind, I will tell them to expect you the first Saturday of July."

"Now—" Dumbledore continued without pause, his tone much quieter, "I would now kindly ask that you all leave me to my thoughts."

Professor McGonagall sent him an enraged glance, no doubt indicating that this would not be that last of the conversation, and stormed out of the room with a grand flourish of her robes.

When Hermione's gaze moved away from her, she found that Dumbledore had already turned away from them, standing up to peer into an odd marble structure that supported a small pool of incandescent liquid. He did not turn back.

Having accomplished what she had set out to do, she quietly left the office. Dimly, she recognized that Snape was right behind her.

"Professor," Hermione said tightly, grudgingly, unable to ignore his presence any longer, "are you _trying_ to rack up…debts from me?"

The taller man looked down at her with an implacable expression. Finally, he said, "Don't flatter yourself, Miss Granger. I merely find the idea of foisting your impending self-destructiveness on Moody...infinitely amusing."

And then, he turned on his heel and left.

A little more than a week later, Hermione arrived on the doorstep of 12 Grimmauld Place.

* * *

"Excited?" a voice asked enthusiastically, uncomfortably close to her ear.

It took her a moment to process the identity of the voice, and when she did, Hermione slowly slipped the wand that had been waiting outside of her pocket at the first hint of noise back into her robes. How paranoid had she become? She hadn't even _left_ yet.

"Um, I guess?" Hermione responded, turning her head to meet Tonks. "It'll be nice to finally get out."

The sentiment wasn't untrue. She had been cooped up in the dark, musty manor hidden among muggle homes for almost three weeks, though lively it had become with scores of witches and wizards constantly entering and leaving. The Order, Hermione had learned, was _huge_ now, having grown exponentially since last summer.

True to her 'age, experience, and skill set,' Moody had relegated her duties primarily to information gathering—as in collecting, organizing, and analyzing information from witches and wizards doing work far riskier than her.

That was—until now. Because today was going to be the first time Hermione joined Tonks and some of the more active, though still relatively low-level, members—Hestia Jones, a pair of devilishly good-looking young aurors-in-training whom Hermione still did not know the names of, Amelina Vance (the much younger sister of an older member), and an apparently prodigious talent in auror training she had recently heard of named Cepheus Fornax—outside.

"I mean, it _is_ totally minimal-risk," Tonks acknowledged, rolling her eyes, "Moody's not going to let you in on anything remotely dangerous for a _long_ time coming. But it's the first mission I'm heading, because I have the most experience out of you novice lot, and I'm going to make it as exciting as possible! Ooh, maybe we'll stop for ice cream on the way back…"

A hand reached out from behind them and thwacked the pink-haired auror solidly across the head. Tonks yelped, before paling as she spotted her mentor.

"I swear," Moody growled, "I take my eyes off of you for ten seconds and you regress back into the buffoon who stumbled in at the beginning of auror training years ago. You better damn well not screw up, Tonks. Where's your team?"

Tonks rubbed her head, grumbling. "I don't know, old man, they're somewhere in this giant, creepy house. We're not leaving _yet_ , anyway."

Moody's rotating, magical eye glared at her fearsomely. " _Get them._ I'm briefing now."

Tonks scowled but quickly acquiesced, apparating away to find the other members. This left Moody alone with Hermione.

Moody glowered at her for a moment in silence, before speaking. "You're the youngest on this team."

Hermione nodded, glancing down at the unfamiliar robes she had been given to wear. They were a dark and deep maroon like Tonks's—a sort of unifying effort, she imagined, on the Order's part to counterpoint the black uniforms the death eaters wore. Underneath, she wore a pair of worn, loose-fitting jeans and a t-shirt, which she knew didn't especially help advertise the maturity the older man was clearly looking for in her.

"Albus didn't want me to put you on any missions," the man growled, a hard expression on his face, "and I've made it a general policy so far not to include _kids_ without any auror training. But you've worked hard these past few weeks and Tonks has told me you've done unprecedentedly well in the drills and bouts she's been running among the novices."

She tried to stand tall under this inspection, aware that Tonks liked her and might have been overenthusiastic in recommending her for this mission. She also had the compelling urge to glare back at the scowling man, but restrained herself.

"And then there's the fact that you've clearly got the…itch," Moody drawled, his good eye narrowing on her. "It's why I'm letting you out now. I reckon your head's still screwed on tight enough not to make a total mess of things, instead of the disaster you might create later."

Hermione stiffened. Despite her greater ambivalence, there perhaps _was_ a small part of her that felt information-gathering was no longer enough to keep the darker of her thoughts silent. It was disconcerting that someone else had seen that, because she had tried her best to hide it and appear grateful with what they _had_ allowed her to do.

"I'll do my best," Hermione managed lowly, belatedly adding "sir—"

" _We're ba-ack_!" Tonks's cheerful, loud voice announced. Several pops followed and one by one members of the novice team apparated into the narrow room.

Moody's attention moved as swiftly away from her at it had arrived at her.

"Jones," Moody nodded at the first who appeared, a deep olive-skinned witch. His gaze then roved over the pair of handsome aurors, one blonde and the other red-haired, who arrived next—"Alcon, Dorian—" then to the elegant, long-necked witch leaning against the fireplace—"Vance"—before finally landing on the charismatic, upshot wizard who popped last into the room with a cocky smile—"Fornax."

Moody widened his stance once he had everyone's attention. "This is Hermione Granger—" he pointed out, jabbing a finger in her direction—"she's seventeen and a Hogwarts student. Keep an eye on her; she's a part of the team today."

They all nodded, though she caught sight of some odd looks directed her way.

"This is a simple reparation job," Moody continued curtly, "the site was attacked by death eaters about twenty hours ago. You need to step in, remove any curses and jinxes left behind, fix the damage, and then step out. Nothing too complicated. Shouldn't take you more than two hours."

"Where's the site?" Amelina Vance asked.

Tonks answered her. "A shop at the outskirts of Diagon Alley. We're flooing there through Fortescue's." She winked at Hermione as she mentioned the ice cream parlor.

"Twenty hours ago?" Alcon grimaced, "We have to wait four more hours for the low risk window to pass to minimal." Hermione cocked her head, wondering what the 'risk-measurement' was dependent on.

Moody nodded with steely eyes. "That's right. Wait here until it's time and then head on out. Tonks—" he nodded to the metamorphagus—"good luck. Constant vigilance, alright?"

"Yeah, yeah," the witch scoffed, her hair turning purple as she waved him away. Rolling his eyes, the elder auror left the room.

They all stared at each other uncomfortably in silence for a few seconds. Hermione was more than aware that most of the glances were directed her way.

"Hogwarts, huh?" Amelina announced finally, chewing some pink gum between lipstick-reddened lips, "What house?"

"Gryffindor," Hermione answered. "You?"

"Same," she returned simply. She did not say anything after that.

When the pause grew a little too long, Hestia Jones gave her a kind smile and spoke. "I was in Ravenclaw."

"Me too," the pale-haired Alcon added swiftly, clearly catching on that the house-declaring had become a form of introduction and a salvation from silence.

Dorian paused a little before revealing in a firm tone, "Slytherin."

"I as well," Cepheus told her, a haughty smile on his face. He looked at her with enough challenge that she felt he readily expected and _welcomed_ her to start shrieking and cursing him out of Grimmauld Place.

Which was maybe not entirely unfair, knowing what many of her fellow Gryffindors felt about Slytherins. Granted, Hermione herself had never exactly had the best impression of them either—her encounters with Slytherins over the years had hardly left her with giddy memories. But, for all his awfulness, Snape… _was_ why she was here. And she was hardly one to be consciously narrow-minded.

"And I'm from Hufflepuff," Tonks declared, "Now that we've made the Sorting Hat proud, I'll fill you all in on my grand plan of action. Like I mentioned before, we're flooing to Fortescue's; I think it's best if we exit through the north entrance and then through here—" she conjured a map and pointed at the desired path with her wand—"to the shop. It's very mom-and-pop; easy target for You-Know-Who to make his presence known without much effort. As Moody said, it should be relatively quick. The shop's really not that big, so we should be able to split up individually and divide and conquer. Thoughts?"

"Sounds good to me," Hestia responded. Some nodded in agreement, but not everyone.

"Well, it's a solid plan and all," Amelina drawled, popping her gum, "but could we just head out now? My roommate's been riding me hard about how late I've been getting home. I reckon she'll kick me out if I get back past midnight again."

Tonks pursed her lips, glancing at the clock.

"I would appreciate getting back early as well," Alcon added, "I've got an examination in training tomorrow."

The metamorphagus grimaced back at them. After a moment of consideration, however, she declared, "Alright. But we split into pairs instead, okay? And we never tell Moody." She didn't wait for agreement. "Hestia, you're with Alcon. Amelina with Dorian. I'll be by myself, and Hermione—you and Cepheus."

Tonks led them to the main fireplace and pulled out a pot of powder, gathering some powder in her hand, before passing it on. In the next ten seconds, she was sucked into the fireplace, followed by Hestia, Amelina, Alcon, and Dorian, leaving Hermione and Cepheus behind.

"I'll go first," Cepheus told her in a tone that brooked no argument. He threw his powder down, shouted the location, and vanished.

Alone for the first time, nervous, exhilarating energy zipped through Hermione's veins as she stared at the fireplace. Once reason returned, however, she forced herself back into her pervious calm. "Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor," she enunciated clearly, tossing the powder in. An uncomfortable sucking sensation—though nowhere near as bad as apparation, which she had learned—pulled at her body until she landed upright with a loud thud in a pleasant pastel-colored room with black and white tiling.

"We're all here," Tonks declared with satisfaction, her hair turning a deep chestnut color presumably to help her blend in. She waved to the portly man standing behind the counter. "Thanks, Mr. Fortescue!"

She ushered them through the northern entrance of the parlor to the heavily cloudy evening sky outside. Hermione took in the sight of what Diagon Alley had become with a pale face.

Vendors, though mostly con-man and con-women, no longer stood outside shouting their wares. Only the odd customer scuttled around, a decided contrast to the usual bustling crowds that filled the alley even during off-season. And, to further the effect of the storminess of the sky, the colorful, external displays had been moved inside, casting the long lines of tall, crooked shops in soulless gloom.

"Bloody hell," Alcon muttered, hand flexing for his wand.

"I know," Dorian intoned quietly.

They arrived at the shop in no time, a true mom-and-pop—as Tonks had noted—rare potion ingredients apothecary housed in a small, narrow building. The façade of the shop had faced extensive damage, including exposed parts of the third and fourth floors now visible to the outside.

Cepheus dissipated the floating skull and snake mark above the building immediately, a hasty spell murmured under his breath that Hermione didn't quite catch.

"Hermione, Cepheus," Tonks ordered, a grim expression on her face, "you handle the outside." She marched into the wrecked shop, maroon robes billowing behind her. The rest followed.

"How many N.E.W.T.S. do you have?" Cepheus asked her after a short pause.

"I haven't taken them yet."

"O.W.L.S.?" he pressed.

Hermione's lips thinned. "I don't know yet."

"Were you _held_ back a year?" the auror-in-training scoffed derisively, "No wonder Tonks wants me looking after you."

Her nails dug into her palms as she looked for patience. "No, I wasn't," she returned through gritted teeth, "And somehow, I imagined there would be a lot less chatting during this."

"Watch it, Granger," Cepheus drawled, "or I might drop you on your head before I return you back to your parents."

Jaw clenching, she ignored him and cast her attention to the damaged third floor. Cepheus raised a brow at her, before turning his attention to the fourth floor.

For the next thirty minutes, they worked together to repair the shop. If Cepheus had any thoughts about the spells she used, he did not reveal them, attention fixated instead exclusively on his work. Sparks went off inside the building every few seconds, lighting up the windows, and indicated that another curse had been dismantled.

It was nearing the hour mark, that the ground started trembling beneath her feet.

Hermione paused in her casting, eyes darting around to find the source of the disruption. The trembling seemed to be extremely localized, the buildings in the distance unaffected.

Beside her, Cepheus inhaled sharply.

Her gaze settled on where his had landed. About half a mile down the pathway was a standalone, towering structure, surrounded by a dark, swirling mist.

A mist that indicated the arrival of death eaters.

" _Fuck_ ," Cepheus cursed, his face becoming pale.

Behind them, the others had begun exiting the shop. "What's happening?" Tonks demanded, the last to arrive outside.

Hermione felt a strange sense of unreality wash over her. "Death eaters."

Tonks's hair went black at the news, looking remarkably like Sirius for a moment, before settling on a menacing red.

"We need to get out of here," she commanded quietly, dark gaze observing the thick haze. "Now."

The others nodded without argument, already turning to face the direction of Fortescue's. Hermione was slow to move, her gaze locked on the darkening building.

"Come on," Hestia murmured, pulling on her arm.

Before they travelled far, however, they heard screaming. It was impossible to ignore where it originated from.

Tonks stopped immediately, her expression twisted with indecision.

"No," Amelina said immediately, an urgent look on her face, " _No_ , Tonks. We're aurors-in-training—we're not ready to die yet and we're certainly not ready to kill anyone if it comes down to it. Let's head back to headquarters, and they can send the more experienced members over."

But kind, gentle Hestia voiced what they all knew to be true, a grim look on her face. "They won't get back here in time."

It was clear that Tonks was conflicted, her own instincts telling her to go back but unwilling to make everyone else do the same.

"We'll split up," Hermione said when no one else spoke, aware that she was probably stepping out of line in the experience-based hierarchy but uncaring of it, "some of us can go back to warn the Order and some of us can go in and help."

"Splitting up could be suicide for the people who go in," Dorian responded, a tight look on his face, "We have no idea how many death eaters are in there."

"It could be suicide if we all go in too," she reasoned calmly. "The point is, we _have_ no idea how many are in there. This way, we ensure that some of us survive, and maybe we can save some of the people in there too."

They evaluated her words in silence.

Finally, Alcon spoke up. "I agree." Slowly, the others nodded as well.

"Alright," Tonks spoke quickly, a steely look in her eyes, "Amelina and Hermione, you're heading back to Fortescue's. Anyone else who wants to go with them can too. We won't think any less of you for it—honestly, you're doing the smart thing here."

After a moment, Alcon raised his hand, an imperceptible tremble to his lips. "I'm sorry, I—I can't," he said stiffly, "my brother…I'm all he has left, and I promised him."

"We understand," Hestia told him gently. "You don't have to explain."

Alcon nodded sharply, a relieved expression on his face.

Even Amelina, usually aloof, reached out a hand to rub his shoulder in support. "Some day in the future, I go in," the elegant witch offered them with a tense shrug, despite Hestia's assurances, "But not today."

Tonks gave them a fierce grin, before worried eyes fell where the screaming could still be heard. "Well get out of here, won't you? And tell them to send some heavy-hitters back to clean up the scraps _we_ leave behind."

Amelina straightened. "Will do."

Tonks took off without another word with Dorian, Cepheus, and Hestia at her back.

Alcon reached his hand out to Hermione—ostensibly to side-along apparate her to Fortescue's because he assumed she hadn't yet learned how to apparate herself—but she didn't take it. She stared at the hand for a moment, knowing that she _should_ , knowing she was far outclassed by even the least trained of the team, that the smartest thing for her to do was to go back to Grimmauld Place with them.

But she couldn't.

Instead, she muttered an apology to them and apparated by herself to the front of the death-eater ridden building.

"Hermione," she heard Tonks growl at her, "what the _hell_ are you doing here?"

"I'm coming too," Hermione told her bluntly, holding her wand up in front of her as she joined them at the entrance.

"Look," Cepheus hissed, "we don't have time for this! Get out of here and—"

"Have you any of you ever killed someone?" she demanded thoughtlessly. They looked back at her with wide eyes.

"No?" she breathed, her voice suddenly incredibly hoarse, "Well, then, that—that probably makes me one of the most prepared to walk in there."

Hestia was shaking her head. "Hermione, what are you saying—?"

"This isn't the time," Hermione managed through gritted teeth, turning her gaze to Tonks, "You _know_ I can help in there. I put out that fire in the ministry."

Tonks looked at her for a long, torturous moment like she wanted to punch her across the face.

Finally, she snapped, "If we survive this, I'm going to bloody _murder_ you when we get back."

* * *

Author's Note

Please, please, please review! I'm really not sure if I should continue this, so feedback will definitely be helpful!


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

They were under attack the second they entered.

She heard Tonks cast a shield charm behind her, before a shove landed between her shoulders that sent her stumbling behind a rack of suspicious looking artifacts.

Hermione scowled at Tonks's over-protective behavior, but ultimately took her hidden location as an opportunity to take in her surroundings. Keeping her wand at chest level, her eyes darted around the room to identify its occupants.

The death eaters made the job easy, having completely foregone their masks. It was unfortunate evidence that they intended to leave no survivors behind in the house.

Hermione immediately identified Dolohov, the long scar decorating her midsection tingling in remembrance. A flash of pale blonde caught her eye—Lucius Malfoy, who appeared to have escaped Azkaban. In the other corner, torturing the shopkeepers, were Rookwood and Yaxley. She caught sight of at least two other death eaters she did not recognize ransacking the rest of the shop and looting certain ancient-looking artifacts.

It was painfully clear that she, Tonks, Hestia, Dorian, and Cepheus were both outnumbered and outmatched. The incident they had intervened in was not a random raid; members of the elite echelon of death eaters had been sent here. Indeed, she was reluctantly confirming that they were in what truly looked to be like the worst-case scenario.

Yet, it seemed that the universe was not yet done laughing at her expense. Because just as she had begun to think that their chances of survival could not look slimmer, a hoarse, bark of laughter echoed throughout the room.

Hermione froze, chills racing down her spine as she turned. Because—

How— _how_ could she have forgotten about _her_?

Black's long limbs flexed almost lazily as she stepped out from an unnoticed back room. At once, she managed to fill the room in a way the others death eaters did not, her presence electric and near-suffocating. Dark brows shadowed the Dark Lord's lieutenant's gaze, but the sharp, pale cut of her jaw gleamed in the light of flying curses, a hard, ruthless edge on a face that was already devastating in effect. She wore the same menacing robes, black slacks, and dragon hide boots she had worn at the ministry.

Hermione watched as Cepheus caught sight of her first, his eyes widening with panic. Hand trembling, he fired a stunning spell. But his aim was off and it landed a good foot to the left of her.

Lips curving to bare her teeth, Black's wand hand flicked out with seeming instinctive speed in response, sending a blinding flash of light that missed Cepheus barely as he dove to the side.

He hit the floor solidly, grunting with pain. "Someone get the shopkeepers and leave," he shouted, rolling over when more curses followed, "I'll— _fuck—_ keep her busy!"

The death eater tilted her head back, exposing the long column of her neck as she peered down at him. "You'll keep _me_ busy?" her low—almost boyish—voice repeated mockingly, uneven bangs shifting as she cocked her head to the side. "You don't look like much. Just you?"

Cepheus huffed an arrogant laugh, his face too pale to make it genuine. "Try me."

"Not just him," Hermione cut in curtly, knowing that there was no holding out anymore for a strategic entrance into the fighting. This was it.

She stepped out from behind the rack, wand loosely in her hand—ready to move in an instant. Dark, metallic eyes followed her.

Cepheus lunged to his feet, a wild look on his face. "Are you _crazy_ —"

"Granger," the rough voice interrupted him, and the words in his mouth became soundless. He stared at the both of them, his mouth slack.

Black repeated it again—torturously slowly. " _Hermione_ …Granger."

"I see I made a proper impression," Hermione said softly. Her eyes darted around the room, then widened minutely. Rookwood and Yaxley were down, leaving the shopkeepers free for apparation. Escape was conceivable now—if someone could get to them without dying.

"I see you've come back to play," Black said silkily.

Hermione cautiously made her way to stand opposite Cepheus, so that the three of them made a triangle. It was now the second time she stood on the opposite end of that wand, and it seemed far deadlier than it had the first time, unbacked as they were by the rest of the Order.

The Dark Lord's right-hand barely held her wand in her own hand, when suddenly, viciously, she attacked.

The prowling death eater fired off a series of violent-looking curses with frightening ease and dexterity, all the while her lips moving inaudibly with blurring speed. Some part of Hermione's brain recognized that this was odd; at the ministry, the death eater had not required verbalization once to cast her spells.

But she was much too preoccupied, at the moment, with currently preserving her and Cepheus's lives.

Glowering, Hermione fired a reductor curse in a crackling, stream of white light in between the shields Cepheus had erected. She was entirely unsurprised when Black merely leaned a couple of inches back, viewing it like an errant kitten that had swiped a claw at her. The death eater raised a brow when the side of the shop came down where the spell hit. Eyes glowing, she gave a wicked laugh and fired her next curse, lips moving again.

Surprisingly, although she and Cepheus had barely gotten along before, they managed to fall into a semblance of a rhythm. He had taken to constructing complex shields and firing defensive spells, while Hermione had largely assumed the offensive, being quicker and lighter on her feet.

The strange, unexpected rhythm broke, however, when they heard Hestia cry out. Hermione turned her head immediately, hoping Cepheus would be able to manage for a few, precious seconds.

"We can't apparate!" Hestia cried to her, hands on two of the shop keepers. Dorian was in a similar position next to her. "Something's stopping us from apparating!"

Tonks released a stream of vicious expletives above them, firing a nasty looking curse at Malfoy.

Hermione felt like the air had been punched out of her. _Couldn't apparate_? But they had been able to apparate in, which meant there hadn't been any permanent wards placed. So how could—

She stiffened, her gaze flashing to the silently moving lips that were so puzzlingly inexplicable.

Fuck. _Fuck._ Black had been chanting a curse to keep them from apparating, just like Quirrel had chanted a curse to keep Harry off his broom their first year. Except, unlike Snape, Hermione _didn't_ know the counter-curse to this particular curse. Which meant she somehow had to stop Black from talking.

Only, she and Cepheus had yet to land a spell on her.

"We need to get close to her," she hissed under her breath to Cepheus, firing an expulso curse as she weaved her way around the spells that slipped past the shields.

Cepheus grunted, sliding back a few inches as his shield struggled against one of Black's curses. "No, Granger, I'm not _fucking suicidal_."

"Listen," Hermione snapped, ducking under a stray curse from Tonks's fight, "We're not getting out unless we do."

A look of great reluctance quickly flooded his features.

But—inch by inch they pressed closer. And they did so at a cost. A severing charm soon caught Cepheus's side, and dark, thick blood began to spill onto the floor below him. Hermione was luckier, a curse catching the side of her cheek but only glancing it.

It was blatantly clear that Black was still toying with them. Neither of them could match her experience. Cepheus had to be scarcely two years older than Hermione. Hermione herself had never received special training, and she had spent the last year in Umbridge's useless class.

(But, perhaps, it was precisely because Black was toying them that the next minute occurred as it did.)

"I…can't…keep this up…much longer!" Cepheus snarled when another one of Black's spells hit his shields with too much force.

"I know," Hermione breathed, sweat dripping into her eyes. They were about two meters away, which may as well have been a kilometer at the rate they were advancing. Being closer required them to respond with even greater speed to Black's spells, and they were not faring well.

Bending sharply, she just barely deflected a powerful jet of black light. In the corner of her eye, she watched it crash into the large mirror behind them. The glass started crumbling into a coarse, black powder before catching on fire.

And then Cepheus started swaying on his feet beside her. She gritted her teeth, praying that he would be able stand for some time more—a _minute_ more.

She had resolved herself to almost certain defeat by the time he fell to his knees. But then, at the last possible moment of consciousness, he raised his wand and roared, " _LUMOS MAXIMA!_ "

A burst of white, blinding light emerged directly into Black's eyes.

And somehow, the fundamental, basic spell taught to Hogwarts in their very first year managed to slow the death eater's wand hand. Imperceptibly—only slightly.

It was enough.

Hermione lunged forward, firing an impediment jinx which she knew could slip past the particular shield charm Black was using, and it landed true. Black's movements became sluggish, decreasing in speed by magnitudes of ten.

But grey eyes only flashed at her—the chanting, slow as it was, did not waver.

Groaning, Hermione darted forward, hoping she could cover the distance in time to slip past Black's shields and send a stunning curse directly into her chest. She could have sworn she moved faster than she ever had before in her life, her wand arm already whipping out to send the spell.

But just as the tip of her wand began to light, the jinx broke and Black's hand snapped to her wrist with unimaginable swiftness, jerking it to the side. Hermione's other hand lashed out in the same breath, tightened in a fist that she aimed at the death eater's face. Long, powerful fingers possessed this wrist too, locking it in place.

Mocking eyes gazed down at her, inches from her own. There was a darkly amused look on the taller death eater's face, knowing that she had Hermione pinned. Against her own face, Hermione felt the victorious fanning of Black's breath as she continued chanting. Breath through pale lips that smirked at her.

And unthinkingly, knowing only desperation and the taste of escape so close, she did the unimaginable.

Their lips met hard, hot and painful against each other.

In the distance, she heard Hestia scream " _Now!_ " and sounds of apparation filled the room.

Black's head tilted back with the force of the contact.

A pop echoed somewhere near behind her.

Before she could react, long fingers reached up to her head and tightened painfully in her hair. Hermione inhaled sharply, certain this could be the moment she would be yanked off and placed under the cruciatus curse and then killed.

She didn't take the chance.

Fingers locking into the silken cloth of Black's robe, she shoved the Dark Lord's lieutenant into the towering stack of tomes behind her. Then Hermione spun, sweeping the room and, finding no lingering hint of maroon robes, apparated in the next step.

She landed on her knees in Fortescue's, breath hitching. Dimly, she recognized Mr. Fortescue's hand on shoulder, a concerned voice asking her if she was alright. She didn't pause to think. Grabbing the pot of floo powder located on the table near the fireplace, she tossed the whole thing in, grabbed the portly man, and shouted, "12 Grimmauld Place, London!"

When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in the exact room she had stood in only three hours ago.

"Shut the floo connection, Moody!" she heard Tonks bark. Hermione's gaze immediately went to her, grateful to see her looking generally fine despite numerous bleeding wounds on her body.

Moody stepped forward, a thunderous look on his face as he spelled the fireplace. Then, he turned his enraged glare on her.

"Are you alright, Granger?" he asked. The words didn't register immediately. She caught sight of Dorian, who stood with a lost look on his face, an arm held crooked at his side, next to Amelina and Alcon.

A hand snapped angrily in her face. "Answer me, Granger! _Are you alright?_ "

"I'm fine," Hermione assured with forced calm, eyes scanning the room. "Hestia, Cepheus, where are they?"

"They're getting medical attention," Tonks told her immediately, a pale look on her face. "I—I think they'll be fine. I just—I can't believe we made it out of there."

" _YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE EVEN BEEN IN THERE!"_ Moody roared, spittle flying from his mouth. His pegged leg went flying, crashing through an urn beside the fireplace.

"I know!" Tonk screamed back, a tear running down her face, "I know we shouldn't have. I—We—Just a couple of hours, we didn't _think_ —"

"YES," Moody barked, "Yes, you didn't _think_. Those risk assessments aren't polite suggestions, Tonks! _They're there for a reason_!"

A stern pair, a witch and a wizard, entered the room then. Without a word, they began fixing Dorian's injuries. When they finished with him, the woman went to Tonks while the man went to Hermione, healing the wounds on her body.

"I sent back-up, the best I had on hand," Moody raged, his lips trembling with fury. "But they kept sending back their patronuses, telling me they weren't able to get in."

"It was Bellatrix Black," Dorian spoke up, "she did something to prevent us from leaving. But Hermione—"

"I handled it," Hermione said as tonelessly as possible. She didn't pause to think about what she had done.

Moody's gaze landed on her again, the magical eye spinning rapidly. "Well," he grunted, "good fucking thing you were there then." Suddenly, the grizzled, infamous auror looked terribly weary. "Blast it, Tonks. I thought you were _dead_. I thought you were all dead."

The metamorphagus lifted her face from her palms. Shifting in the seat she had fallen into, she mustered a humorless smile. "We're way too awesome for that. And you can't get rid of me that easy, old man."

Moody almost smiled back, before he seemed to remember himself. Then, the thunderous look returned to his face. "We'll see about that. I think the amount of desk work I'm going to assign you from here on out might just do the job."

Tonks sneered without any vitriol, the blame she directed toward herself and the guilt she felt clearly visible in her eyes.

Moody straightened to his full height, turning a grim face on all of them. "Albus has called a meeting tonight among the core members to discuss this nightmarish mess. I don't care if you're tired or feeling a little mopey or just want a good old batch of mum's homemade porridge—you _will_ be there. Or I will personally strap your asses to the first—"

He didn't get to finish his threat. The door slammed open with a loud bang to reveal Remus Lupin. The former Defense Against the Dark Arts professor's scars stood out menacingly on his face and exposed forearms, and he looked leaner and harder than Hermione remembered.

A frantic, almost mad, gaze snapped across the room before he settled on—to Hermione's surprise—Tonks. Then, Lupin seemed to pale even further, his face tightening with what could only be described as murderous rage.

"You—" he snarled, his voice a primitive, rasping growl, " _You—_ "

"R-Remus," Tonks stuttered, her eyes wide and disbelieving.

He stalked to her and yanked her up by her robes. Tonks allowed the manhandling without protest, looking very much like someone had told her the year was nineteen eighty-four instead of nineteen ninety-six.

Moody thumped the taller man's back loudly. "Oh, let her go. I did some good shouting already." Lupin didn't look like he appreciated the gesture.

When Lupin's seething gaze then landed on Hermione with an undercurrent of horrified shock, she grimaced, and hoped that Moody could find it in himself to save her too.

* * *

Two hours later, the core members of the Order of the Phoenix sat tensely around a veritable feast of a dinner which, while impressive, did nothing to lighten their mood.

Hermione could feel the heavy weight of Ron's mother's disapproving gaze on her as she sat at the table with the rest of Tonks's team. To say that the older woman had been unhappy when she had arrived an hour ago and seen her there, a part of the Order…would be such a gross understatement it was essentially a misstatement.

Pushing his spectacles up with a long, narrow finger, Dumbledore met the gazes around the table with remarkable evenness. There was a certain quality to him that rendered him at odds with his typical grandfatherly demeanor.

"While it gives me great pleasure to see so many welcome faces gathered here," the headmaster began gravely, nodding to Hogwarts teachers, parents, and ministry high-ups alike, "we must now speak of the unfortunate event that brought us together. First, I would like to inform you all that there were no fatalities, and that those who were injured are expected to make a full recovery."

Tight faces relaxed slightly all around the table. Dumbledore turned to his left, "Moody?"

The auror straightened in his seat. "About four hours ago, a novice team of aurors-in-training and one Hogwarts student left for a routine reparation job at a site attacked twenty hours previous. They had…ignored instruction to wait the four hours until the risk assessment passed into the minimal risk window. While there, they witnessed a new attack occurring nearby at a rare ancient-relic store. Two returned to headquarters and called for back-up, and the rest decided to intervene."

A square-jawed, menacing looking man, whom Hermione had recently learned was the current head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, leaned in. "We need more details, Moody. How many on the novice team intervened, and who were the death eaters?"

In a monotone just as good as her mentor's, Tonks explained what had passed and left no details behind. At the very end, Dorian took over for her. "Black was chanting a curse while she was fighting Granger and Cepheus," he explained. "It prevented everyone from leaving or entering the shop. The curse didn't break until Granger managed to sort of…head-butt her?"

Hermione twitched slightly in her chair.

" _How_?" Madame Silius, a beak-nosed Wizengamot member, pressed sharply.

"Dumb, Gryffindor luck," a voice answered stiltedly from behind them. "And…extremely skilled…one might even say prodigious…help from an immensely…talented Slytherin."

They turned to meet the face of a wan Cepheus leaning weakly against the wall, clearly intending to join them.

"Fornax," the head auror growled, "I told you to keep your ass in that bed for the next twenty-four hours."

"I'm fine, sir," Cepheus waved off, slowly, carefully, settling himself into a seat on the other side of Amelina.

"And—that's _it_?" a Wizengamot member exclaimed before the head auror could debate the manner. "Then you apparated?"

"Yes," Hestia answered quietly.

They all seemed to wrestle with that for a moment in silence.

"She was toying with us," Cepheus admitted eventually in a low voice, "If she had been taking us seriously…there's no way I or Granger would be sitting here now."

Professor McGonagall straightened abruptly in her seat, then turned with blazing eyes to face Dumbledore. " _See_ , Albus? They're far too young to be here, and yes, I cannot stop _them_ —but I will not rest my case about Ms. Granger!"

Mrs. Weasley was not going to let it stand either. "Merlin's beard, she's a _child!_ "

"Actually, she's seventeen—" Tonks began to point out.

"Enough," Dumbledore interrupted. The older man's lips were tight, his eyes turbulent. "I…understand your concerns, but this is not why we have all gathered here today. Severus, have you any new information on your end?"

Hermione's gaze snapped to the potions professor without her permission.

"The Dark Lord was searching for a particular item. He did not take the liberty of…informing me what the item was, as I was not assigned to the raid. Only Rookwood and Yaxley were tortured upon their return, so I believe that the item was retrieved."

Madame Silius thumped her hand emphatically on the table. "Then we must question the shopkeepers as soon as possible."

"They're in a medically induced sleep right now," Hestia told them, her dark brows furrowed in worry, "They need the rest."

"But—"

"Whoever is here in the morning," Dumbledore said sternly, blue eyes piercing Madame Silias. "after Madame Pomfrey has permitted us, may participate in questioning them. I believe this meeting is now adjourned."

Hermione released a gust of air, immediately standing up. She saw Tonks attempt to follow her but the headmaster stopped her with his gaze. The pink-haired witch abruptly sat back down. Hermione sent her an apologetic glance, but also was all-too eager to get out of there before Mrs. Weasley could lecture her again.

Just when she thought she had escaped, having made her way well into the hallway, a hand grabbed her shoulder.

Sirius Black stood behind her, an uncomfortable look on his face.

"We need to talk," Sirius said bluntly, seeming discomfited by his own presence there. "I never got to…thank you."

"Oh," she exhaled, a tight feeling rising in her chest.

Sirius shifted slightly on his feet. "I—I can't imagine how that night would have turned out otherwise."

Hermione's eye caught on a moving emerald cloak. It took a second for her brain to process that Professor McGonagall was moving towards them. Hermione felt a wave of panic flush over her, her ears suddenly feeling quite hot.

"Look," Hermione muttered, "maybe we could talk about this some other time—"

"No, no, I need to get this off my chest," Sirius said gruffly, barely hearing her. "The point is, if you hadn't, you know, with Nott—"

"Granger." The previously much-loathed voice washed over ears like a veritable hallelujah from divinity itself and cut Sirius short.

Sirius immediately bristled like a feline assaulted by water. A thunderous look snapped to his face to cover what had been there seconds before. "What the hell do you want, _Snivellus_? Can't you see that two people are having a fucking conversation?"

"Oh, is that what you call it?" Snape drawled, "Because Granger looked like she would rather be diving off the Astronomy tower. Though, in fairness, that may very well be what your conversation partners keenly desire when attempting communication with you."

"Oh, fuck off," Sirius hissed, a nasty look distorting his handsome face. "Why don't you run back to whatever slimy, infested hole you crawled out of—"

"Professor," Hermione butted in and tried not to look too desperate, "was there something you needed to discuss with me?"

Snape met her gaze blankly. "Yes," he said after a moment, nonchalantly, "the extra credit you desire to fulfill this summer."

"Extra credit?" Sirius echoed, a dumbfounded look on his face.

"It might have occurred to you, Black," Snape drawled without pause, "that as a professor, I do suffer from certain responsibilities. Although, I imagine the notion of responsibility is altogether foreign to you."

"Listen, you little—"

"I'm terribly sorry," Hermione interrupted, giving Sirius what she hoped was an apologetic smile. "This is really important for my school work and maintaining my grades."

Air hissed through Sirius's teeth, but he clearly attempted to reel back his temper for her benefit. He gave her a sharp smile, a "We'll talk later," and then turned and left.

Inexplicably, Snape stayed beside her unmoving and silent as the hallway slowly cleared out before them, instead of leaving a few seconds after as well.

"Well, _did_ you want something?" Hermione asked finally, when it was just the two of them and no bomb had exploded.

The potions professor didn't even turn to face her, the profile of his face and his prominent nose instead meeting her gaze.

Hermione's lips twitched without her permission.

Finally, he blinked at her slowly. "I don't like you, Granger."

"I know. I don't particularly like you either, sir."

He turned to face the painting on the wall again, an unreadable expression on his face. And then, he left as well.

* * *

Author's Notes

Yeah. So. That happened. Review if you want more :D


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five  
**

* * *

"Hermione! Hermione, they're here!"

She shot up from her position on the couch, sending the book on her lap toppling. Behind her, she heard a growl.

"Those books are ancient, Granger," Moody scowled. "Treat them a little better."

That was probably the first time someone had ever had to state those words to _her_. But she was much too excited to care. "Sir, I would like to go downstairs. My friends are here."

Moody rolled his eyes. She took it as permission and raced down the stairs.

When at last she reached the foot of the staircase, she spotted two figures hovering near the entrance with Mrs. Weasley. Ron had grown more freckled over the summer and slightly stockier to match his height, though it was hard to determine the extent of the change under his too-big Chudley Cannons jersey. Behind him, Harry stood at roughly the same height he had been when he had left for the summer, but a heretofore unseen layer of short, almost indiscernible, hair covered his jaw.

She grabbed Harry's hand, the first limb she managed to make contact with, and drew him in for a tight hug, immediately proceeding to do the same with Ron after. When they finished, they stood at least for a minute in silence, smiling stupidly at each other.

"Oh, come on you," Mrs. Weasley huffed, barely masking the beaming look on her own face. "Into the dining room for supper. Arthur will be bringing Ginny, George, and Fred around midnight, but the Order members that _are_ here will join us—I think we have a fair number in the manor tonight."

She ushered them through the arched entry way to the massive dining table Hermione and everyone at Grimmauld Place had been eating at each day. The normal black table cloth had been replaced with something more festive.

"Take a seat. I'll go gather the others." She vanished.

Harry turned to her again. "So, when did you get here? Mrs. Weasley made it seem like you've been here for a while."

Hermione knew that this was the moment to come clean. Hoping to get it over with like ripping off a band-aid, she let the words flow out of her in a rush. "Actually, I've been here the entire summer. I decided to join the Order."

After gaping at her for at least thirty seconds, Harry was the first to regain his voice. "How?"

The word was uncomfortably accusatory.

"I'm seventeen," Hermione responded slowly.

Ron swallowed, looking a little pale. Otherwise, however, he looked unmoved by the news. "Wicked. I always figured you'd be good at research and stuff. It's worked miracles in the past."

She didn't exactly have the chance to tell him that she wasn't working strictly in 'research' anymore. Harry had stood up, his chair making a loud, abrasive sound as it was forcibly pushed back.

"They let _you_ in?" he demanded. "They're letting you in, when I've been the one to face him all these years. How does that make sense?"

Ron shifted in his seat, looking uncomfortable but not unsympathetic. "Calm down, mate."

"No, Ron. _Don't_ ," Harry snarled. The anger that had cloaked him much of fifth year had come to the fore.

Her wrist twitched at her side. And rapidly, Hermione felt her own newfound temper—forged in the confusion and self-loathing and fear of the past few months—rise potently, acutely, a bitter taste flooding her mouth.

"Despite what you might believe," she told him coldly, "there are reasons Dumbledore and the Order allow only adults to join."

"You think I don't know that?" Harry snapped, an ugly, incredulous laugh in his voice. "You think I don't _remember_ Cedric? Or what almost happened to Sirius?"

"Exactly," Hermione shot back at him. "And look at how old they were when that happened. I'm not trying to be an obstacle to you, Harry, _really_ , but be practical. Dumbledore lets you in and then what? You're put in ten times more danger than you already are."

"You know why I need to join," he growled. "If I ever want to fulfill the prophecy, I need to fight."

Hermione bristled at his tone: brash, unthinking, confident that he knew best. It was the first time it had grated against her like this.

"You want the truth? You're not ready for it," she snapped. "If you were—if you were, you would have learned Occlumency last year. You would have taken it seriously."

Harry recoiled like he had been struck. Ron frowned too. "Hey, Hermione, isn't that a little out of line—"

"It's true," she responded sharply. "If he had, we probably wouldn't have gone to the ministry in the first place. Though, at least now everyone from Seamus's mother to Zachariah Smith knows that Voldemort's back."

Harry glared at her. Hermione just glared back. Before the argument could escalate, Mrs. Weasley swept into the room with Moody and more than ten other Order members.

"Harry," Sirius rasped, his voice thick with emotion as his gaze lighted on his godson. The glower slipped off Harry's face like melted paint, his expression transforming into something much warmer and painfully tender. He rushed forward to clasp his godfather in his arms.

Cepheus stepped forward from behind the pair, sneering at the overt display of affection, to join Hermione on the other side of her. "Hungry, Granger?"

She glanced at the feast Mrs. Weasley had orchestrated into existence before them with appreciation. "What do you think?"

Ron scooted forward in his chair on the other side of her to gaze at the table's latest occupant. He reached out a hand. "I'm Ron Weasley."

"Another one." Cepheus looked at the hand with blatant incredulity. "Merlin's beard, how many _are_ there?"

"Just shake his hand," Hermione hissed. Sending her a look, the auror-in-training deigned to delicately grasp Ron's hand.

Ron grinned amiably at him. "So, you work with Hermione, do you? What kind of, uh, research have you guys been doing lately?"

"Research?" Amelina drawled, interjecting into the conversation. She slid into a seat opposite Hermione with Dorian and Alcon on either side of her. "Aurors-in-training do a lot of information gathering, but that's not really what we're up to here, Weasley. Certainly not what _those_ two are doing."

"Oh," Ron said simply, looking somewhat confused. Then, realization flashed across his face. " _Aurors in training!?_ "

"Please take a seat, that should be all of us," Mrs. Weasley announced sternly, interrupting the ongoing conversations. Harry looked relieved when Sirius sat opposite him, next to Lupin. Other wizards and witches reluctantly followed, Mr. Weasley himself falling prey to his wife's reprimanding gaze when he was slow to take his seat.

A loud pop sounded from the hallway, effectively managing to compel them all into surprised silence. Mrs. Weasley didn't even blink. "Come on in!"

There was a long pause. Then, light, even footsteps neared them in perfect rhythm. Within seconds, a tall, dark cloaked man stood at the arched entrance to the dining room, cutting a dramatic silhouette against the lighting of the hallway.

"Severus," Lupin said, smiling politely, "I'm glad to see you could make it."

A disparaging gaze shot with lightning quickness over the contents of the room. "Believe me, I had little choice in the matter."

The only available seat left (the table was charmed to provide only as many seats as were needed) was next to Sirius and Moody at the head of the table. An unreadable expression on his face, Snape walked toward the seat with his robes billowing behind him.

Ron groaned beside her. " _That's_ not going to end well."

He wasn't wrong.

Hermione had scarcely begun cutting into her slice of shepherd's pie, when a loud clang sounded throughout the room. Sirius had violently dropped his silverware back onto his plate, a furious look on his face.

"Problem?" Snape drawled disinterestedly.

"Yes," Sirius hissed, ignoring Lupin's warning glance. "I don't think I'll be able to stomach my meal sitting next to a _murderer_."

The pumpkin juice that had just gone down her throat soured instantly.

"Severus is an Order member, Sirius," Arthur said tiredly.

"And what about before?" Sirius challenged loudly. He turned to Snape with his teeth bared. "How many innocent people did you kill when you were You-Know-Who's loyal pet? How many fathers, mothers, and _children_ did you torture?"

Snape put down his fork and knife slowly, his face deathly pale but expressionless. "Are you finished?" he asked tonelessly.

"Don't think you can fool any of us here," Sirius snarled, eyes sparking. "You don't care about any of this: saving muggleborns, innocent people. Do you think we didn't notice? Any moment now, you're going to be running off again to join—"

"Could we eat, please _?_ "

Belatedly, when eyes all across the room snapped to her with shock, Hermione realized that the interruption had come from her. Sirius met her gaze with slight bewilderment. Harry and Ron both gaped with disbelief. Snape didn't even bother to look over at her.

Hermione tried to smile. "It's been a long day for some of us. I think I can speak for the others when I say that we're starving."

"I'm hungry," Cepheus intoned helpfully, though his riveted gaze darted between the two black-haired men like he was watching a tennis match.

Sirius's expression betrayed his utter incredulity. "How can you eat next to someone who's killed—"

" _Really_?" The forced smile fell off of Hermione's face abruptly.

Understanding slowly filtered into Sirius's face; then, defensiveness. "You know what I meant."

Mrs. Weasley looked like she had had quite enough. "I don't know what's happening here, but we are all going to dine, _silently_ , no arguing. Or I swear, I will hex you all into silence. Is that understood?"

No one answered, but the rest of dinner did in fact pass silently. None of the food tasted quite as it had previous nights, though. And when she climbed the five flights of stairs later that night to her room, the meal weighed heavily in her stomach.

As she reached the fifth landing, she saw another figure a few meters ahead of her. She recognized him immediately.

"Professor."

He turned sharply on his heel, and it was immediately clear that the events from dinner had left Snape in a thunderous mood. When voices neared them from below the staircase, she stepped away from the landing and into the corridor to stand beside her professor in the shadows.

Snape's expression darkened further. "What do you want, Granger?"

She gritted her teeth at the annoyance on his face. "To talk. Obviously."

Snape's eyes flashed in warning. "I see no reason for a conversation between the two of us."

Hermione's eyes narrowed. "You gave _me_ a reason."

"And when did you hallucinate that?" A harsh, sarcastic retort.

She smiled unpleasantly. "You didn't pretend like I hadn't said anything at all, professor, during that detention. And then you helped me into the Order."

The potions professor's face contorted with silent rage at those words. "And you think I have some sort of obligation towards you now? This war exists beyond you, you insufferable—"

"I know that," Hermione snapped.

"Understand this, Granger," Snape hissed, his face paling, "I don't know what it is you want, but you are not getting it from me. Go _somewhere else_."

When she spoke, her voice was brittle. "Where? My friends? Believe it or not, I think I want to strangle Harry right now just as much as you do. Should I tell Dumbledore, then, professor? Have him tell me that what I did was okay, that it was self-defense, but look at me like—with _pity_ , like I'll never be the same again, that I'm _lesser_ now?"

Snape's lip curled. "I see you've succumbed to irrational fear, now."

"You and I both know the only reason I haven't seen that look yet is because Sirius is too grateful and you're the only other person who knows," Hermione hissed.

"I didn't drop you on Moody's doorstep for my own private amusement, Granger," Snape bit out.

The implication that she was supposed to have confided in Moody made her feel uncomfortable. Not that there was anything wrong with the auror. Pointedly, however, Hermione didn't want to tell _another_ person what she had done for as long as she lived.

"He reports everything to Dumbledore," Hermione responded after a moment. She didn't actually know if that was true. But Snape's lips thinned—so maybe it was. "Look, I just want to know if you've heard anything about…Nott."

The name threatened to choke her on its way out. After it had been released, she swallowed reflexively a few times, eyes stinging.

Snape's face was suddenly unreadable. "He and his mother have left the country."

Hermione's jaw slackened in horror. "Because—"

"In part," he answered tonelessly, "But the Dark Lord has played the largest role in this decision, I imagine."

Her mouth opened and closed soundlessly a few times, before she a chilling thought struck her. "He was going to make Nott replace his father."

Snape did not give any indication regarding whether or not that was true. But she knew, somehow, that it was true.

"Did—" Hermione asked, expression tightening, "Did Black get punished for what happened at the ministry?"

Snape's head snapped to her sharply. "Why are you concerned with Black?"

She pursed her lips, unsure how to respond. She settled with, "No particular reason."

He surveyed her nonetheless, expression razor sharp.

Hermione felt her mouth twist. Finally, she said, "At the ministry. She was the one who fired the killing curse. At Hogsmeade, she remembered my name."

She didn't know what Snape saw on her face, but his gaze shifted away from her when he answered, stoic. "There are some that the Dark Lord considers too valuable to punish."

Hermione contemplated that for a moment. A strange intuition struck her, and she raised an eyebrow. "Like you. He doesn't punish _you_ , does he? Every time you're here—I've never seen you injured."

Snape smiled. It was not a nice smile. "Potions-making is a subtle science and an exact art. The slightest tremor, as often occurs from prolonged exposure to the Cruciatus and other torture curses, would nullify my value."

Not for the first time, Hermione wondered how Snape had ended up teaching at Hogwarts. There were wizards and witches who had pursued potions mastery for years beyond their Hogwarts education, who had devoted their lives to studying the discipline, and yet, Voldemort had chosen Snape to be his potions-maker. Clearly Snape was a prodigy in the field—and it was clear that he had no love for teaching.

"And Black?" she pressed.

She knew she paled as soon as she posed the question. Her fingers trembled with a frenetic, unnamable energy.

His answer was cryptic. "Black isn't like other death eaters."

"Of course not," she muttered.

Hermione's jaw tightened when Snape began to peer down at her with narrowed eyes.

"What?"

His mouth lifted in a sneer. "You are hiding something, Ms. Granger. For your sake, I hope it is either unimportant or it outs itself before it is too late."

She rolled her shoulders back, striving for nonchalance. "There's no such thing, professor. Anyway—nice talk. I'll be sure to reach out to you the—"

"Don't."

"—next time I need advice," Hermione finished with a wide, unfeeling smile. She spun on her heel and headed toward her room to turn in for the night.

* * *

It took her what felt like hours to fall asleep. When she did, unconsciousness slipped over her like a wet blanket—uncomfortably, jarringly. Her dreams started as they normally did: dark, vague, non-specific.

Then, they fractured.

Wind blasted past her. Suddenly, there _was_ a her in the dream, she could see herself in her mind's eye. The gales rendered whatever her dream-self wore obsolete and raised goosebumps on her flesh.

Eyes watering, she blinked rapidly and found a dark treacherously mountainous landscape before her. In shock, she took a staggering step backward—

—and gasped when her back met a taller, heated form.

When her head jerked back, her eyes locked with a charcoal, mocking gaze.

"About time," Black's hoarse voice hissed against her ear, "I've been waiting for you, Hermione Granger."

A hand grasped her chin, tilted her head up, and then a pair of lips landed ruthlessly on hers.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Thanks so much for reading! This is probably the most "niche" fic I'm working on right now, so please, please let me know that there is active interest! I would love to hear your thoughts :)


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